


Introspection

by TGP



Series: Interspecies Mating Rituals [1]
Category: Next Avengers
Genre: Canon Divergence, Continuation, F/M, Polyamory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-25
Updated: 2012-07-25
Packaged: 2017-11-10 17:07:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/468676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TGP/pseuds/TGP
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three years after the defeat of Ultron, keeping the city of survivors going has become common place but Torunn doesn’t mind too much because she has good company.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Introspection

**Author's Note:**

> This is the start of a much bigger story. I needed somewhere to jump off of and set the mood, so I did this, thinking the piece would be way bigger before realizing just what it was. Besides, I needed to get a handle on writing these awesome kids.

If Torunn had to choose, her favorite time of day is dawn. Torunn rises with the sun as if it calls to her blood, and blossoms in its glory. She cares as little for the night as she does for the cold, which only reminds her of things long past and memories better forgotten. The golden streams of light give her a hope that has been growing, nurtured by the growing success of their new home.

New City, which is called about a dozen different things because certain people can’t decide on one name (Torunn had offered Midgard and added Central behind it to make it seem more city-like, but no one seemed to like it,) is a sprawling vision of… Well, it is rusty yet, but at least it exists and its getting better everyday. The skyline has no grace to it, buildings constructed by salvaged metal from Ultra City, but the uneven sprawl is something Torunn has become accustomed to.

She still thinks Midgard Central is a good name.

As light stretches over the whole of New City and wakes up its growing population, Torunn smiles to greet the day before she leaves her comfortable perch on the cliffs high above. If she is lucky she will be able to enjoy a little flying before any of the boys woke. There is training to be done for they all knew Ultron might return one day, but the more important task would be venturing into the robot city to get supplies and scrap.

A shout from below catches Torunn’s attention. She zeroes in on a pale headed boy and swoops down to meet him. Hawkeye gives her a rakish grin.

“Ready to throw down, Gorgeous?”

Torunn smiles back because after so long, she knows his flirting is meaningless. Which… is a pity, actually. But he has never moved to turn it into anything else and here and there, she’s caught him with others. She has wondered often if he simply prefers other normal humans instead of a girl who can easily break him in her hands. Some men are like that.

They’re nearly eye to eye. Torunn is one of the tallest females in the settlement, second only to a skinny brunette who manages the food stores and gives them lists of things to look for while they’re wandering. Torunn likes her but the boys are less impressed and maybe that’s why Torunn doesn’t mind her being around. Better than the prettier girls that somehow have visible fat stores in strategic places that Torunn does not give a damn about.

She also does not let herself glance towards her chest and wish she were growing out of her armor.

Hawkeye likes to lead and Torunn doesn’t mind letting him most of the time. Mostly, she just enjoys their trips out together. They never leave alone, as per Tony’s orders, and Torunn understands the logic. She knows she’s as mortal as the rest of them. Besides, it gives her an excuse to watch over her brothers. Even Pym and Azari, enhanced by their blood as they might be, are weak in comparison to her. Weak and overconfident and filled with masculine bravado that she understood and holds herself. Still, they need looking after.

Hawkeye and James are normal humans and Torunn never lets them leave without her. They are a little stronger, a little faster, but human nonetheless. It is her duty to protect them but she doesn’t mind.

She likes the moments she can spend alone with them.

Ultra City had been silent and still for three years, but Torunn never lets down her guard there, not when she has the boys to look after, or more rarely a full human scavenging crew. There are parts of the city none of them have touched yet and traps they have not found. She’s even more alert with Hawkeye, even though he’s more careful than she is. Hawkeye knows things, terrible things, and it is not for danger that she’s alert for. It is for the signs of stress he will not voice and the memories he barely holds back.

“Oh,” she hears and looks down immediately at the soft, quiet tone. There is nothing different about the sprawling corridor and its many off shoots that she can tell but Hawkeye’s gaze is far away and long ago. He stands so still and then closes his eyes and it fades in an instant like everything else he refuses to tell them about. Torunn wonders if he’ll ever trust them, trust _her_ , but she doubts it. He has terrible, terrible secrets. Torunn reaches out to touch his shoulder but before she can, he’s smiling at her again.  “Lets keep going.”

She nods and he doesn’t give her time to think on it much longer. Funny how being able to fly doesn’t make tailing someone on the ground much easier. Not that Hawkeye’s definition of grounded is anything like hers. He is beautiful as he leaps about from one unsteady foothold to the next, as graceful as Azari if less bendy. His motions are economical and efficient and most of all _silent._ She doesn’t hear his bootfalls or even his bow shifting against his body. No arrows clattering, no unbuckled fasteners clunking about. Not even the air seems to move as he cuts through it.

Torunn has come to terms with the fact that she notices these things and even if Hawkeye does not look at her, she won’t stop looking at him.

They find what they came for and haul out much needed supplies to the team waiting outside the city. It’s long, boring work but they’ve gotten used to it and they know that as soon as everything’s brought back home, they’re free for the rest of the day. Free, of course, means training and scouting but that’s on their schedules and out in the wastes of the world, rather than the dangerous robot city.

By the time Torunn and Hawkeye get back with the scavenger crew, the others are back from their own tasks. Azari shoots them a grin that’s brimming with barely leashed energy. It’s one Torunn returns because she feels the same. Her hand goes to her sword hilt and Azari’s smile widens until she sees teeth a little too sharp and wonders what they would feel like digging into her throat.

By the time James has figured out that everyone is as bored and raring for the fight as he is, they’ve already corralled him far outside the city limits to somewhere it’s safe. Safe for the normal people they care for. He still misses the starting punch Azari swings but it isn’t aimed at him so Torunn doesn’t point it out. Instead, she’s jerking to dodge around it as she drops her sword to the side and strikes with her fist, only to have that crafty little bastard twist right out of her space and she barely manages to pull the punch that would have lain Pym out for a good few minutes. Instead, it just knocks him a few yards off but she’s already letting her body move with the momentum so she can get at Azari or maybe James because he’s in her way and that’s okay too.

Tony calls this training just to keep the refugees from wondering if their heroes are crazy. It’s really just a free for all and Torunn usually wins by virtue of her inhuman strength and stamina, but James has been known to outlast her and Azari holds tentative second place.  Not that it matters. Only Hawkeye and James keep track of their own wins and only to grumble about it later to incite some kind of argument.

Pym catches her in the eye with a sting and the pain is sudden enough that Torunn nearly lets Azari knock her over when he spring boards off her shoulders towards James with Hawkeye on his tail. She snarls out a curse and backhands Pym, but the swing is wild enough that its weak and he recovers from it quickly. And damned if he isn’t hard to catch when he’s shrunk down! Torunn knows when to cut her losses and she escapes Pym by giving him something more important to think about. That is, the fact that she gets Hawkeye by the leg and swings him right at the kid. She hears Pym’s yelp of outrage even before one of Hawkeye’s practice arrows hits her in the shoulder – she really admires the way he doesn’t let a little thing like lack of stability stop him from taking the shot – with a burst of black dust. Torunn loses her grip on him, coughing wretchedly as the stuff gets in her eyes and her nose and her lungs. She knows it was Tony’s idea so Hawkeye could practice without killing them, but she hates the dust bombs _so much_.

Something hits her in the side – too big for Pym, too small for Hawkeye -  and stumbles nearly off her feet but she manages to curl her fingers around a whipcord arm – Azari, ha ha, got you! Even without being able to see yet, Torunn whips her captive over her body and twists to bring herself down on top of him. When Azari his the ground, the breath goes out of him in a pained wheeze. Her eyes are still tearing up fiercely from the dust, but Torunn manages to take in the look of him defeated under her, flushed with excitement, eyes bright-

She wants him. Thoughts, distractions, some other time maybe. Some time when she isn’t pulsing with adrenaline and can think properly and tell herself exactly why she keeps silent.

For now, she pats his cheek and gets up to go after the others.  James took Hawkeye out while she was down so Torunn joins Pym in ganging up on him. Except a stray kick sends Pym flying and then its just her and James and a careful use of strength and finesse.

James moves fluidly from one place to another, flipping over her and turning in air as if it were thicker, something he can get a foothold on. She’s not even sure he isn’t liquid, really, because that’s the only way he could dodge her so well. They’re pretty evenly matched until he brings out the shield and she lets herself get serious. The shield doesn’t – exactly – hurt. Not in any real way she cares about. Sure, it leaves bruises, but she doesn’t fear it and she certainly doesn’t fear James. They’ve been tumbling together since they were first lumped together. Torunn doesn’t remember a time before it and she hopes she never does.

James pushes her in a way even Azari won’t. He makes her think instead of react because he’s not as fast as Azari or Pym and he’s more close quarters than Hawkeye. As Torunn throws another punch, James slides under it and whips his body around to force her down even as his knee comes up to slam into her face. Pain blinds her a moment but her fingers grip cloth and she flings James away from her. She hears his impact and grunt before she can see again. Torunn readies for more anyway but James waves a hand, giving in so he can stay crumpled at the bottom of the rock face. Torunn grins at the few grumbles that come her way and then something hits her in the back of the head and the next she knows, she’s staring up at three worried faces.

“I am so, so, so sorry-” she hears and it takes her a moment to realize the shimmering thing flitting before her face is Pym. “I didn’t mean to, please don’t pulverize me!”

Torunn scowls, not because its his fault, but because she has to concede the victory. But she waves him off as he continues to apologize and lets James and Azari drag her back to her feet. It takes a moment but then she’s steady and fully awake.

“A worthy battle,” she says finally, hands on her hips, and Pym gets himself back to regular size. He still looks a little shame faced, so Torunn remembers to compliment his victory the entire way home.

The fight did its job. They’re more focused, better suited for the more menial work they’re needed for. The city has a long way to go before its finished but Torunn is proud to call it her home.

She still thinks Midgard Central is a good name.


End file.
